Ice fishing is a popular winter pastime and devices for use in such fishing have been much improved in recent times.
A typical device employs a support having a post to which a line carrying reel is rotatably connected with the support enabling the device to be positioned at or over a hole through the ice with the baited hook at a selected depth. A length of a straight, narrow spring has one end connected to the post and a signal flag attached to its other end. When the device is ready for use with enough line pulled from the reel to place the baited hook at a selected depth, the spring is manually curved to an extent enabling it to be releasably connected in one way or another to the reel or the line in order to free the spring when a fish takes the bait with the flag then elevated to signal that event.
Difficulties experienced with devices of the above described type are that the lines often become caught as holes freeze over and that the flag carrying spring often becomes accidentally released giving a false signal to the angler. Wind is a common but not the only cause of such false signals.
In earlier devices, the reels were located to be above water, but as the lines extending downwardly through the holes frequently became locked in ice, if the temperature was low enough, later devices, when set up for use, had their reels positioned to be below the surface of the water. Each such later device had its flag carrying spring releasably held by a trip extending downwardly through a tube and exposed to be releasably connected to the reel by a trip mechanism. While the lines of such devices did not become frozen in the hole in very cold weather, the water in the tubes freezes rendering the trip mechanisms inoperable. In addition, it remained necessary to keep each hole open in the event of a hooked fish or to enable the condition of the bait to be checked. In addition, the signal flags often were accidentally released as the trip mechanisms were not positively held.